Hi back!
Like I said I didn't intend to write another post. As I started to write a response to a comment by Mr. Venkat Ganesh on my previous post. I figured it was so long that I made it a post of its own. So here it goes...
That's a good suggestion, Venkat. However, it's inefficient on its own.
Awareness programs do happen everywhere, all the time. And if our Government was the kind that took actions, well, our country would have been in a very different condition all together.
To cause a change of such a stature would require a long, continuous and combined effort...
Young boys and girls, each and every one of them should be educated. As far as I know, the eve-teasers and murderers in this case too, were uneducated, lawless men. Education puts a fear of the law, as mild as it may be, in the minds of people. So if the same men were educated enough, probably, they would have stopped for one second before stabbing the two boys to death. But of course, they didn't give a damn about the law, didn't have a care for the lives of people; just plain, fearless, drunk attitude to stab anyone who comes in their way to do what they wish to do. Even if it might be the most inhuman, cheap, outright disgusting act.
So yes, step one would be education.
My second suggestion would have been awareness, but what are we going to make both, men and women, aware about? Well, attitudes don't change by listen to some random person talk about ethics, or watching a "informative" film. So here I'm going to state the almost impossible. We need help from the government and law enforcing bodies in the country. Did you just laugh? Well, I did say it was impossible, almost.
The society is a cycle. You want rules and laws, establish a government. You want them to enforce those laws, ask them. After a few years or decades, you become lazy and don't bother checking up on them. They happen to be glad you just did the same. And that's how we get stuck in the rut.
So if we want the government to do something, a) let's try to get them to do something about it. They must be corrupt or lethargic, but somehow I'd like to believe they wouldn't want women or men to get harmed this way. After all, it could be someone from their families as well, no?
And of course, whether or not we demand of it, the government should be sensible enough to DO something about it. Seriously. They eat our taxes, spend it on building statues and empires for themselves, build colleges that guarantee their whole friend circles' kids admissions. Seriously dear cops and politicians, at least keep us SAFE? Keep the money if you like. I can earn my money and give away some, as charity or tax, whatever (same thing, no? Or wait, charity helps.); but I don't see how I can protect myself or my friends from a situation like this.
So summing it up:
a) EDUCATE people. Boys, girls, mummies, papas, kakas, kakis, nanas, nanis, bhai log, behen log, EDUCATE them all. I, for one, education and knowledge can change a person, the society, the whole wide world. It is one of the most powerful tools the state's nannies can use to build a good population.
b) ACT. The government should act. Do what they can at the very least. Alert cops, traffic police, or any other civil servant to be at the service of any fellow human being in trouble. Furthermore, create punishments and put them to force in a way that not just a human, but even an alien would think a million times before doing anything ethically and morally unsound.
c) Lastly, I'll reach the heights of being philosophical by quoting apna very own bapu, Mahatma Mohandas Karamchand Gandhi.
"Be The Change You Want To See "
This is the most important action we can take ourselves. We don't know for sure whether the civic bodies would do anything or whether education would truly stop a person from being a criminal of any nature, but the least we could do is not be dumb, mute and blind to something like this. You see something wrong on the street, Stop and Ask what it is. Don't pass by without doing anything. I think not doing anything in situations like these make us as guilty as the criminals themselves. After all, watching and doing a crime happen at the same place and the same time, don't they?
So well, that is what I think can be done. Of course, like I said, the society and change in it is a cycle. A lot of efforts would have to be made in a lot of areas by a lot of people (hopefully everyone).
Hope you aren't the one who puts on black sunglasses and walks out on a crime scene; and are the one who helps(
Au revoir,
Miss Bee.
I tweet on: https://twitter.com/#!/DevikaBharadwaj
